I have opted for the straighter shanked hook (or very slight bend) for lake scuds. I have not yet attempted to perfect how to rib the shellback with the bead in the middle. With the straighter shank the shellback appears to be more durable and likely to stay in place, rather than skewing to the side as it seems to do on a curved pupa/scud hook. Still an experiment for me….no sweat. I will get back to it some day. I tied a dozen of these and never got around to smaller sizes. I will see how they work. The dubbing mix was a leech pattern mixture I bought from some Kamloops’ tyers at a flytying expo. It was sold as a good leech dubbing…the photo shows the mixture of colored filaments quite well.